


When R convinced E to have fun for the revolution's sake

by Myr



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, early modern carnival au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-07
Updated: 2018-02-07
Packaged: 2019-03-15 04:27:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13605516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Myr/pseuds/Myr
Summary: It's carnival in an early modern french city, Enjolras refuses to participate, but a drunk Grantaire makes him reconsider.(This is literally just me practicing writing Grantaire's brick style rants by dropping every bit of information from a 2016 lecture on early modern carnival in a short fic. This means all references and arguments/ theories Grantaire mentions regarding carnival are academically approved. I'm just posting it bcs I'll lose it otherwise and it did help me get trough my exam)for reading when you literally went trough the whole ER tag and are bored out of your mind only





	When R convinced E to have fun for the revolution's sake

Enjolras looked around the room from where he was grumpily tucked away in a corner of it. He was watching his friends and the other guests at the ball get drunk and eat to excess from behind his mask. 

The vidame de Courfeyrac was watching his guard Bahorel, who was trying to stuff an entire quail in his mouth. On the other side of the room the poet Jehan was writing poetry on the table, dressed as a wildman in only a few leaves. It was the day before lent and fasting started, and the duc de Montparnasse was organising the carnival festivities. 

As a young noble without a title, Enjolras planned to get into the city counsil as soon as possible, and that ment socialising with the opposing factions too. 

But oh, how he loathed this worshipping of gluttony and useless waste of resources. Some of the poorer families saved all year and then threw away their earnings at ridiculous costumes and overly expensive food that they would puke back out before the night was over. He looked away from Bossuet, the surgeon's assistant, Joly, the doctor's apprentice and Feuilly, one of the woodworker artisians, gambling away their wages for the month, and his eyes fell on a seemingly passed out Grantaire. 

The painter, disguised as a jester, was lying diagonally over the 5 steps leading up to the dais, and had lost his shirt and mask during the earlier festivities. Because he was known to cross the boundaries of normal drinking behavior on normal days, and this was carnival, Enjolras sighed and got up to check if he was still alive. He walked over, crouched at the top of the steps and poked R in the chest with his toe. Grantaire, skin slightly glinstering with sweat, with his face painted white and his lips red, lazily opened his eyes.

"What do you require of me, oh nobelest of lords?" Enjolras tssk'ed at his dramatics. R knew he hated unnecessary groveling for the nobility, and insisted therefore on overdoing that each time. 

"What are you doing?" He snapped. Grantaire just smiled and closed his eyes again. 

"Well, your magnificent highness, since tonight I have already wasted money, drink and food, I have now started on the next thing to waste." 

When a confused Enjolras didn't reply, R sighed. 

"I'm wasting my time." 

Enjolras snorted and Grantaire grinned, anticipating E's answer. 

"-Yes, I am aware that I do this every day already, but carnival has a very useful social and cultural function and I am therefore required to do my best at it even more than usual." he stated matter-of-factly, still trying to be funny. 

Of course Enjolras latched onto the wrong part of the message. 

"What social and cultural relevance could this debauchery possibly have?" He huffed, sitting down next to R, already completely in debate modus.

Grantaire, never one to waste an opportunity to argue with Enjolras, opened his eyes and rolled on his side. 

"First of all it is a ritualistic subversion of our usual behavior. This moment serves as a symbolic end to the winter. It creates a feeling of community. There is also a focus on the socialising and cultivating aspect of youth-" 

Enjolras interrupted with a snort. Grantaire probably had already emptied several bottles of wine at that point, because he made little sense to him, even though infuriatingly enough, he somehow always managed to stay rather coherent and more eloquent than most nobles. 

"How can stuffing yourself to the point where we can not afford it be educational? How will that teach anyone that not everyone has acces to food and that we should share with others? How will people become in any way more responsible because of this?" 

"If we look at it from a christian point of view, it is didactic. In the two state model of Augustinus, there are these opposites too and the emphasis is on the proces from the earthly state to the other, godly state. All mankind is confronted with sin before they can find god. Thus while we first live a sinful life on carnaval, we need it to find our way to god in the period of fasting that will follow." Grantaire explained, waving his hand around. 

Enjolras wasn't too impressed "I thought you did not believe in anything. You are dressed as a jester and yet you talk of god?" 

Grantaire grinned, already aware Enjolras cared litte for religion. "Touché. Thus we have come to the moment to put the jester in the centre of attention-"

R motioned at his own half discarded outfit and Enjolras suddenly became aware that they were quite close and that R still wasn't wearing any shirt. "The jester is the one that does not know god, the fool. By filling the city with the souls for which there shall be no rest, mankind is reminded of their own mortality and their life choices. If we are all jesters for a day, we see the army of lost cases that is trapped between this world and the next."

Enjolras sighed, looking at Bossuet and Joly who were both intensly kissing a beautiful gipsy lady and lord Pontmercy lying passed on a table murmuring sweet nothings to himself.

"That is all very inspirational, Grantaire, but I doubt anyone in this room is actually thinking about lost souls." 

"And yet I am the one that is called the cynic hm?" Grantaire mumbled, still in good spirits because of the wine. 

"Well, your most revered highness. As I said before, this is also a ritual that causes coherence and connection between societies. It is a festivity that disregards social differences. The masks-" He tapped on Enjolras red mask.

"-make anonimity possible, and everyone works together on this. Thus conflicts between social groups can be ventilated before they explode." 

"Unless you lived in Romans in 1580 and it ended in a massacre and failed revolt." Enjolras deadpanned. R conceded that he had a point. 

"But that is why we have more reglementation now." he said, leaning closer to Enjolras, still confident. He grabbed him by the hair and pulled him in so R could whisper into his ear without anyone overhearing. 

"Carnaval always has to do with -corporal functions. A cyclical...intake and release from the body. Food, drink, smoking...sex. This is the same for the king and the beggar, and thus social boundaries are not at work here. In the costumes we lose our identity and become a collective body. This is contrary to what the clerics and nobility stand for. The hypocrisy of the church and the excesses of nobility are targeted. The subversion is a social protest against the two outdated orders of society." 

R suddenly licked Enjolras earshell, voice low, ready for the killing blow of the argument. "The eating, the food, the sex. Its dissent. It's revolution...Enjolras."

Then he let go of E's curls and leaned back, slightly smug. It was very clear that both their pupils were wide blown, even from behind E's mask, and Enjolras let out a deep breath.

"Well, if you put it that way, how can I refuse participation?" he said breathless, probably surprising even himself. His eyes caught on Grantaire's painted lips and he leaned in to crush his own against them. R's eyes widened in astonishment that Enjolras would dare this in public and for a moment they almost lost balance, having both forgotten they were still on the steps.

Enjolras sat up more, angling Grantaire's face upwards while the man opened his lips to invite E to deepen it. R followed Enjolras upwards, unwilling to break the kiss, and put his hands on his shirt so he could follow without looking when E managed to get them both up. He was being pulled out of the room by the loops on his jester pants by an Enjolras that looked more disheveled than he had ever seen him. When they passed by one of the tables, Grantaire grabbed a cluster of grapes and winked at the Vidame de courfeyrac, who was giving him a thumbs up behind Enjolras back.

**Author's Note:**

> Vidame: obscure french nobility title


End file.
